The Box-Bed Kid
by DuCali
Summary: A few Months before moving to Baker Street, Sherlock agreed to something he may have deleted later. Now there’s a kid with curly hair that’s both complicating and simplifying life.


John Watson was not a man easily moved to panic. See: his blog, his general military career, and his steady hands while performing field surgery. Despite that he was sweating through his pants. He had a momentary thought that the sweat coming off his back and making said pants uncomfortable might even soak through his trousers, and that despite the ridiculous palpitations his heart was giving, making him feel flush and overheated, the café he was sitting in was unreasonably chilled.

Sitting across from him was the vision of beauty that, god and the woman herself wiling, he'd marry. She was talking about some girl at work but John hadn't heard a word for the last half hour. His sweaty palms kept brushing against the box holding an engagement ring in his pocket. He was ready for this. They were ready for this.

Just as he was working up the bollocks to actually participate in actual conversation, something pulled on the shoulder of his jacket.

Now. Despite having lived in the shadow of the World's only Consulting Detective for years, John was not an idiot. He was a Doctor, he had a degree thank-you-very-much. That did not stop his brain from short circuiting when he looked to his side and saw a miniature version of that very same Sherlock Holmes gazing at him. It was his eyes- his damned piercing eyes and his stupid curly black head of hair- all concentrated in the cherubic face of a child. And the first thing that crossed his mind was that Sherlock had time-traveled, or maybe been cloned.

In the time it took John to wonder- just a bit- on how likely Mycroft would be to clone his brother, the kid had wheeled back in wide-eyed alarm, before pinching his brows together and scowling back at John's look of absolute shock.

"Is that a fake mustache?" asked the kid with Sherlock's scowl.

John had to wonder with a bit of bemusement whether clones could inherit bad manners.

"No. It's real. – uh. And what's your name?" he asked, half expecting to be lambasted for not guessing it was 'Sherlock Jr.' or something ridiculous. And how like Sherlock - in any form- to interrupt John on the most important date of his life.

"What? That's not important. It's Darcy, but I need to know where Sherlock is."

John's heart did a little thing, which he was unfortunately used to happening whenever Sherlock's name was spoken aloud, where it sort of shredded itself into mince and tried to hack its way out of his chest from the inside. He rubbed at his sternum a bit to alleviate the ache. The kid's eyes followed the movement before flicking back up to his face.

"He's dead." John said, trying to keep the grief off of his face. His eyes roved over Sherlock's possible clone over and over, trying to parse out the story here. Had the kid escaped from a facility?

"Since when?" demanded Darcy, scowling.

"Uh- Years. I'm sorry." Said John, wondering what rock [or facility] the kid had been living under.

"Oh, that's alright then," Darcy said, to John's bemusement. "I already know he faked his suicide. Mum saw him last week when he got back to London. You can tell me."

John froze.

He meant to refuse, likely violently, but the fact that it was a kid stalled him. He didn't know how to react. He closed his eyes and took a breath. Mary spoke for him, thank god.

"I'm afraid your mum must have been mistaken Darcy," she said softly- "He was seen – years ago now. Sherlock Holmes is definitely dead."

"No," said the kid- Darcy – as he squinted between the both of them, "He pretended because of the snipers, on you and the landlady and the copper." Kid looked confused. John felt hysteric. His breathing started to –

"No," he breathed. "No! If Sherlock was alive he'd be here! He would be right here, --"

"Excellent deduction John." Cut in Sherlock. John looked over his shoulder and there he was. John's heart broke all over again- snipers? He faked it? John was unfathomably angry but also- a little touched, if what the kid had said was true at all. Sherlock looked at him, deducted him it looked like. Intense in a glance, like that first day in Bart's Hospital. John felt scraped out. Sherlock's eyes met his for a moment, and they seemed to contain a multitude. His eyes dropped and John suddenly noticed the hastily scrawled fake mustache on Sherlock's upper lip. He wondered how long Sherlock had been listening to their conversation with the kid.

The kid that Sherlock was now kneeling in front of. Seeing them together made it all the more obvious that they had to be related – and all the more obvious that the kid wasn't a clone. The eyes, though they had the same piercing quality and colour were slightly different shapes, and the lips on the kid were just a little off. Other things, that Sherlock had taught him to look for- earlobes, chin structure and the like all matched. The hair was the same wild curls, but had a reddish gleam to it.

John was sure he was in shock. The world went dark.


End file.
